Glouco to install devices to aid emergency response

A string of weather stations will be placed near I-295 and rail lines to assist Gloucester County officials should an event like the 2012 Paulsboro train derailment and toxic leak occur again.

The county Prosecutor's Office announced this week that it had secured $150,000 in funding to buy and maintain nine of the devices, which officials say can help them make critical decisions during emergencies.

The stations can measure wind speed and direction, temperature, humidity, and barometric pressure. Though the devices can be used to ascertain everyday weather conditions, emergency-response officials say they are specifically concerned with the threat of toxic substances being transported.

The county expects the stations to be installed by early next year and, pending an agreement, to be connected to a Rutgers University computer that would make the information available online. If not, the data would be transmitted to the county's 911 center.

The Prosecutor's Office sought and received the funding from the state Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness following the Nov. 30, 2012, train derailment in Paulsboro.

The accident happened when a Conrail train conductor moved an 82-car freight train across a movable bridge over the Mantua Creek despite a red light. Bridge locks were not properly in place, investigators found, causing seven cars to fall off the track. Four fell into the creek, causing one to breach and release nearly 20,000 gallons of vinyl chloride, a carcinogen.

Federal officials placed much of the blame on the railroad.

Weather stations' information allows officials to develop "plume models," which can project how a gas will move, officials said. The county has relied on information gathered at the Philadelphia International Airport.

A portable station was used during the derailment, but "we lost precious time," said J. Thomas Butts, the county's emergency-management coordinator.

Had the stations been in place, he said, "I think it would have given us a jump on what we had to do, and it could have made a difference."

"Plume modeling could have been done immediately," Bill Donovan, critical infrastructure coordinator for the Prosecutor's Office, said in an e-mail.

Models help plan evacuations and shelter-in-place zones, Butts said. The Prosecutor's Office estimated that about 111,000 residents live within a mile of the rail line, which runs from Camden to Salem, N.J.

Many aspects of the train-derailment response have been criticized, including an abundance of misinformation and a lag before officials started to evacuate residents.

Eventually, hundreds were forced from their homes and businesses.

Paulsboro officials have maintained that they worked with limited resources and made the most practical decisions at the time.

News of the weather-station infrastructure arrived as a federal measure to improve safety along rails was introduced.

U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.) announced a bill Thursday that would create new requirements for railroads carrying hazardous materials. One would stipulate that the railroads regularly provide information on the substances to officials in communities through which the materials pass.